


An Encouraging Development

by alicesprings



Category: As the World Turns
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-14
Updated: 2011-07-14
Packaged: 2017-10-21 09:06:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/223473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alicesprings/pseuds/alicesprings
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Luke tells Reid about his kidney transplant.</p>
            </blockquote>





	An Encouraging Development

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to [rhiannonhero](http://archiveofourown.org/users/rhiannonhero/pseuds/rhiannonhero) for betaing this for me!

Luke’s straddling Reid’s lap on the couch, his tongue is in Reid’s mouth, and Reid snakes his hand up under the back of Luke’s shirt seeking warm, soft skin. His fingers stroke gently along Luke’s back while they kiss.

It’s Reid’s day off from the hospital. Katie’s at work, and he has the place to himself, so Luke’s come over to hang out. There’s something pretty awesome about being filthy rich enough to take the day off whenever you want.

They played a few games of chess earlier, and Reid creamed Luke, as usual. By their fourth game Reid was two moves away from winning again when Luke had swept all the pieces off the board with his hand.

“Hey!” Reid had protested.

Luke shrugged and slid closer on the couch, kissing Reid until he forgot what he was complaining about. It had become Luke’s favorite way to end a chess game.

It had become Reid’s favorite way to end a chess game too.

Luke’s been giving Reid some “encouragement” for a couple weeks now. It’s been a pretty swift rise from the somewhat chaste kissing and holding hands it began with, to Luke practically humping his leg whenever they have a little privacy.

Reid’s not complaining.

Reid’s unoccupied hand cups Luke’s ass as they kiss, and Luke grunts into Reid’s mouth, his groin pressed tightly against Reid’s own.

Reid’s terribly amused by Luke’s arbitrary rules when it comes to what is, and isn’t acceptable _encouragement_. Reid’s allowed to grope Luke’s ass as much as he wants, but as soon as his hands try and sneak around to the front of Luke’s pants, Luke yanks his wrist away and scolds him. He has no qualms about shamelessly grinding himself on Reid’s lap though, or about pressing his hard cock against Reid’s abs while he kisses Reid with an obscene amount of tongue. They never get close enough to come though, before Luke pulls away, and Reid is equal parts frustrated and amused at the exquisite torture involved in dating Luke Snyder.

Reid’s tempted to say something, to point out the ridiculousness of it all, and ask if they can just get naked already, but he’s trying not to pressure Luke, and besides, he’s not about to start complaining about a squirming lap full of horny Luke Snyder. He’s not an idiot.

Luke’s hands are under Reid’s shirt right now, his fingers tracing around Reid’s pecs, dipping into Reid’s bellybutton and roaming across his chest.

Luke moans, low and needy, and the sound sends a jolt to Reid’s cock. His hands grasp Luke’s broad shoulders, pushing him down to get more pressure on his aching cock.

Luke arches his back and ruts his hard-on against Reid’s, gasping at the friction.

“Best encouragement ever, Mr. Snyder,” Reid pants, and Luke huffs a laugh.

“Is this okay?” Luke asks between kisses.

Reid grabs hold of Luke’s ass with both hands and urges him to press down harder, an _are you fucking kidding me?_ expression on his face.

Luke grins and grinds harder, his hips moving in languid circles. Reid can tell that Luke’s been enjoying the encouragement as much as he has. It took Luke a while to realize that he could do whatever the hell he wanted to Reid’s body and he’d get no complaints. Hell, Reid encourages him, and once Luke realized that, he began to be more open about doing what feels good, no shame or guilt involved. As much as Reid wants to move onto the orgasms portion of their relationship he’s happy with what they’re doing right now. He’s happy doing _anything_ Luke-related. He knows he’s turning into one of those lovesick fools and he doesn’t even care. Not when there’s this.

Reid’s hands skim up and down Luke’s sides, loving the way his skin feels beneath Reid’s palms. He finds a patch of textured, raised skin on Luke’s side, and he traces along it as they kiss. When Reid realizes it’s a scar beneath his fingers he pulls away from Luke’s mouth, trying to get some blood to flow back up to his brain to make sense of what it is he’s feeling beneath his fingertips.

Reid pants, catching his breath as Luke moves his lips to Reid’s neck and starts sucking on the skin there. Reid’s fingers trace along the scar, feeling the length of it when Luke pulls away from Reid’s neck and shoves Reid’s hand away, pushing his shirt back down.

“What?” Reid frowns.

“Nothing,” Luke says, swallowing visibly. “Just. Don’t touch it. It’s ugly. I don’t like it.”

Reid raises one eyebrow. “What’s the problem? It’s just a scar, let me take a look.”

“Reid!” Luke slides off Reid’s lap. “I just told you it’s ugly. I don’t want you to see it.”

“Are you planning on ever letting me see you with your shirt off? Ever?” Reid asks. “Because I gotta tell ya, I may need to rethink this arrangement if you aren’t.”

“Reid!” Luke groans, rolling his eyes, huffing in exasperation.

“Come on,” Reid says, nodding at Luke’s shirt. “Up, up.”

Luke sighs but turns on his side a little and lifts his shirt, letting Reid see the scar.

Reid studies it for a moment. “Kidney transplant?”

Luke nods, his eyes downcast.

Reid traces the scar with his fingertip, and Luke shivers a little before dropping his shirt back down.

“Tell me about it.” Reid asks quietly.

Luke sits sideways on the couch, and rests his elbow against the back of the couch, leaning his head on his hand. He takes a deep breath and bites his lip, watching Reid closely.

Reid mirrors Luke’s position on the couch, and nods his head slightly in encouragement. His hard-on tempered for now, he needs to know about this, he needs to know how to help take care of Luke.

“I had the transplant when I was sixteen,” Luke finally says. “I was…unhappy. There was a lot of crazy stuff going on with my family, and I was struggling with the whole…gay thing. I was drinking a lot.”

Luke looks away and swallows hard. “A lot. Every day,” Luke says. “It just made everything...hurt less.”

“Luke.” Something inside Reid’s chest squeezes tight. It hurts. “Luke,” Reid says again, because he doesn’t know what else to say.

“It’s a long, stupid story and I don’t really want to go into all the details right now,” Luke says. “But there was this one time when I got really drunk and I passed out in my grandmother’s private jet and ended up in Mexico.”

Reid blinks.

“Anyway, while I was there I got some sort of bacterial infection and it pretty much destroyed my kidneys,” Luke says. “I needed a transplant pretty urgently and, uh, I got one. Not necessarily through...legitimate channels.” Luke looks away, clearly ashamed. “But you know all about the lengths my family stoops to to get what we want.” Luke laughs bitterly.

Reid sighs. Yeah, he knows more than most what that means. He wouldn’t even be sitting here right now if Luke hadn’t blackmailed him into coming to Oakdale in the first place. But he’s getting his very own state-of-the-art neuro wing custom-built, and he’s got Luke. He’s got _Luke_. It was a pretty damn good bargain.

“So I had a kidney transplant and I’m not supposed to drink,” Luke says. “I did though, I was barely out of the hospital before I was downing a bottle of vodka, trying to cut the kidney back out. Pretty stupid, huh?” Luke says, clearly embarrassed.

Reid’s temporarily frozen. The thought of Luke hurting that much? That he’d do that to himself? It takes Reid’s breath away.

“Anyway, life goes on, ya know? I came out to my parents and things were pretty bad at first...but then they got better, and I stopped drinking. I met Noah and things were good, for a little while.”

Luke bites his lip and looks away. “But when things weren’t going well I’d turn back to drinking. It just made things better...when I was drunk. But then when I’d sobered up it’d make them a thousand times worse. I’m an alcoholic,” Luke says. “I’ll always be an alcoholic.”

“How long since you’ve had a drink?” Reid asks.

“About a year and a half,” Luke says. “Things weren’t...going well with Noah, and there was this whole situation with my grandmother’s new husband hitting on me—”

“What?” Reid blinks, not sure if he heard that right.

Luke huffs a laugh. “Long story,” Luke says. “Anyway, I’m trying, really hard, and I haven’t felt the urge in a while. Definitely not since you and I...” Luke trails off.

“Since what?” Reid asks.

Luke shrugs and his lips turn up a little at the edges. “I’ve been happy lately,” Luke says. “I haven’t wanted to drink. And I won’t. Not anymore, that’s a promise.” Luke nods firmly. “But I hurt a lot of people when I was drinking. My mom, especially. My family, and Noah.”

“Yourself,” Reid voice cracks, and he clears his throat.

Luke shrugs, looking away. “I don’t want to hurt anyone anymore.”

Reid's quiet for a moment. “It’s in the past. Don’t beat yourself up about it,” Reid says, and Luke’s eyes dart back and meet his.

“You were just a kid,” Reid says. “So you didn’t handle things too well, what’s done is done. As long as you look after yourself now, and don’t drink, you’ll be fine.”

Reid remembers Luke coming to find him at Yo’s a couple months ago. _"You don’t understand drunks at all,"_ Luke had said. Drunks. It had felt so wrong to hear that word come out of Luke’s mouth. _"We don’t drink because we think we’re better than you. We just have to drink to feel as normal as you do without one."_

Reid had lain awake in bed for hours that night, turning Luke’s words over in his mind. Curious as hell about what he’d meant, and half in love with him already, and pissed at _himself_ for feeling that way. Reid hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it.

Reid gets it now, all the pieces are slotting into place, and it only makes him admire Luke even more. Luke’s been through a lot, and he’s still here, still trying. He made it through that whole mess with Noah’s accident, and all the back and forth with Reid and he didn’t drink. He could have given up on everything, given up on Reid, but he didn’t. Reid’s so proud of him, and so grateful.

But now that Reid knows Luke has a kidney inside him that could fail, that Luke could _die_? Now, just when they’re finally getting started? That thought takes his breath away too.

Luke stares at Reid for a long moment. “Really? You’re not going to…judge me?”

Reid groans and pinches the bridge of his nose between two fingers. If there’s one thing he’s come to expect since they started dating, it’s that Luke inevitably compares Reid’s reactions to Noah’s. _Judgemental prick,_ Reid adds the description to his mental file: Mayer, Noah.

“You were just a kid,” Reid repeats. “I’m not gonna hold something you did when you were sixteen over your head for the rest of your life.”

“But this _does_ affect the rest of my life, Reid! I have to live with this, and any problems I might have in the future, for the rest of my life. And this scar? It’s a reminder! Every single day I see it and it reminds me how stupid I was!”

Luke’s eyes are blazing, his chest heaving from the outburst. Reid takes a deep breath and snags Luke’s wrist, dragging him close and holding him tightly against Reid’s chest. He’s warm, and alive in Reid’s arms, and Reid’s never letting him go.

Reid’s fingers sneak back under Luke’s shirt and he touches the raised flesh of the scar gently, dropping a kiss on the crown of Luke’s head. Luke sighs and his rigid body relaxes a little.

“It’s a reminder that you got through the rough times,” Reid says. “You came through the other side because you’re strong, and you’re brave. Stop punishing yourself.”

It’s much easier to say this sort of stuff when he doesn’t have to look Luke in the eye. Reid makes a mental note.

“And it’s not ugly,” Reid says. “Because it’s on you, and you’re…” _Beautiful_ , Reid thinks. “Not ugly,” Reid says.

Luke snorts a laugh against Reid’s chest and Reid smiles.

“There’s nothing about you that could ever be ugly, Luke.”

After a moment, Luke lifts his head off Reid’s chest and catches his eye.

“Nothing,” Reid says seriously. “I mean it.”

Luke meets Reid’s gaze and his eyes are softer now, calmer.

“Thank you,” Luke says, cupping Reid’s face and pressing his mouth against Reid’s.

Reid smiles against Luke’s lips, wrapping his arm firmly around Luke’s waist and dragging him back onto Reid’s lap.

“Give me a little more _encouragement_ , Mr. Snyder,” Reid says. “And we’ll call it even.”


End file.
